The Harper government has introduced a bill to bring Canadian law in line with a controversial copyright treaty that many critics thought was dead.

Critics fear the bill and the treaty it’s meant to enforce will turn Canadian customs officers into de facto enforcers of copyright law, empowered to seize suspected copyright-infringing materials without judicial oversight.

Bill C-56, introduced on Friday, is designed to make Canada compliant with some controversial aspects of the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA), an international treaty negotiated in unusual secrecy that was roundly rejected by the European Parliament last year, leading many observers to conclude the treaty was dead.

But the arrival of Bill C-56 would suggest Canada and the United States -- which has largely been behind the push to create ACTA -- still expect the treaty can come into force.

ACTA was the target of mass protests across Europe last year, amid concerns the treaty’s provisions would lead to censorship on the internet and the criminalization of small-scale, not-for-profit downloading of copyrighted material.

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ACTA Protests Across Europe

ACTA Protests Across Europe

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Opponents were especially critical of an ACTA provision that would allow customs officers to search for and seize copyright-infringing material, which led to concerns that travelers would have their phones and laptops searched for songs they downloaded without permission.

The bill introduced by Ottawa on Friday does indeed empower customs officers to search for copyright-infringing material, but makes an exception for individual travelers who have material solely for personal use.

The bill also increases criminal penalties on copyright and trademark infringement, introducing possible prison terms for trademark violations -- up to five years for an indictable offence, or up to six months for a summary offence.

Sutton argued Canada’s customs officers would end up mirroring the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which has “seized domain names for allegedly hosting infringing content without a court ruling.”

She concluded: “Extrajudicial takedowns of websites violate our rights to free expression by presupposing guilt and enacting punishment where legitimate content and speech is suppressed. Overall, this new bill is a glaring indication of how willing Canada is to cave to U.S. pressure on intellectual property enforcement.”

Critics also decry the treaty’s plan to create an international ACTA enforcement committee that would be composed of unelected members, as well as the secretive process by which the treaty was negotiated.

Eleven countries, including Canada, signed ACTA in October, 2011. But the treaty only comes into force when six of those countries ratify the treaty in their own legislatures.

Japan is the only country to have ratified the treaty so far. The European Parliament’s rejection of the treaty last summer was seen by observers as having killed the deal, but the treaty can still come into force if five more countries ratify it.